Liberal Senate Democrats and the U.S. State Department are desperate to get the U.N.'s Law of the Sea Treaty ratified.
But Senator David Vitter, a conservative Republican, keeps getting in the way. Through skillful questioning during Thursday's Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing, the Louisiana Republican got a leading treaty supporter to acknowledge that America's enemies can manipulate the process of mandatory dispute settlement under the treaty so that the United Nations Secretary-General plays the key role in the outcome. Vitter called this a "recipe for disaster" for America and urged more hearings into the treaty's flaws.
Ratification wasn't supposed to be this difficult. Republicans on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee were supposed to go meekly along with a treaty that enjoys the backing of the Bush Administration. But Senators Vitter and Jim DeMint of South Carolina have decided they should do their duty and read and analyze the pact. What they have found is frightening. Vitter, in another display of skillful questioning, was able to demonstrate on Thursday that the Secretary-General of the United Nations plays a critical role under the treaty in resolving disputes among nations.
The fingerprints of the U.N. are all over this treaty. That is why it's officially called the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. But because the U.N. has such a bad reputation, supporters of the treaty have been trying to obscure the U.N.'s role.
For example, State Department Legal Adviser John Bellinger III has been claiming that it's a "myth" to suggest that the treaty sets up any U.N. institutions or is part of the global U.N. bureaucracy. But this is the same John Bellinger who told the Senate Committee on September 27 that the treaty has nothing to do with regulating pollution from land-based sources. Vitter exploded that lie by citing actual provisions from the treaty authorizing regulation of land-based sources of pollution in accordance with international agreements. These give international lawyers an opportunity to sue the U.S. and implement the unratified global warming treaty.
Vitter's target of opportunity at Thursday's hearing was Professor Bernard H. Oxman, a proponent of the treaty. The senator zeroed in on how disputes under the treaty are resolved. The treaty permits the two sides to a dispute to pick arbitrators. Here's how the exchange proceeded:
Vitter: "As I read it, they try to choose the arbitrators and if they can't, somebody else?the King of the Law of the Sea Land, chooses three of the five arbitrators. Isn't that the case?"
Oxman: "Absolutely Senator
